Mixtape 361 • Valerian Tea
Steep it hot and drink it slowly, for Valerian Tea is the remedy you are seeking.
Steep it hot and drink it slowly, for Valerian Tea is the remedy you are seeking.

It’s the first night of the year where I arrive at the station in daylight. Also, it’s been unseasonably cool. But neither of those things is as notable as a new album from Toadies which brings up more of that brutal precision fuzz pop that made my ears perk up the first time I heard them over 30 years ago. Elsewhere tonight: a phone call from PJ, on the road, and middle-cased keyboards.
If I played roller derby, I would want The Bobby Lees on my team.

A new album from The Bobby Lees is making its way to us, and I’m banging on the table in anticipation. Also, I meant to call that Alt-J song “Breezleblocks,” it’s a long story. Freaky weather continues!
It’s in your face and back to the grind with the Bobby Lees.

Another special presentation tonight with House Music, a collection of songs about dwellings both physical and emotional. For tonight’s Final Hour, I came up with three themed sets, see if you can guess what they are. It’s like that Connections game!

Exploding out of upstate New York, The Bobby Lees have returned with a their third outing, titled Bellevue, and it delivers more of that biting, can’t-you-see-I’m-in-the-middle-of-an-episode post-rock blues energy. Tonight’s Mixtape closes out with Escape Mechanism’s “Being,” sampling William S. Burrough’s unmistakable reedy voice into an existential mantra.

A solid debut album, with a wide range of energies and emotions, filled with swirling guitars, moments of unabashed vulnerability, and sheer screeching unhinged psychopathy.
The sound of Star Feminine Band is born of Benin, brightly colored patterns, and wild abandon, young carefree voices skipping over liquid guitar and intense percussion.

The journey to the island had been placid, cutting through the postcard-blue waters on the kite hydrofoil like an experienced tailor shearing fine cloth for a new suit. Things were a bit more complicated now that they were at the Heraklion Archaeological Museum. The horologist consulted the mission notes, which simply stated “remove all anachronistic displays.” The historian, fearing seasickness, had taken a pill and was now having a comically adverse reaction that rendered them useless for these judgements. A security guard eyed them warily, but perhaps they could turn the situation to their advantage by playing up the effects as excessive inebriation.